Join the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering for a fall seminar on Wednesday, September 12 from 3:15–4:30 p.m. in Perlstein Hall Auditorium. The seminar will feature Robert W. Lyczkowski, Ph.D., P.E., formerly of Argonne National Laboratory.

It all started with Charles “Charlie” W. Solbrig in the remote wilds of Idaho. He was the first PhD student of Dimitri Gidaspow’s when he was an Adjunct Professor at the Institute of Gas Technology. After Charlie finished his Doctorate in 1966, he joined IGT as an Adjunct Professor. Dimitri was my Master’s Thesis advisor and Charlie was my co-advisor under Dimitri’s advisor ship. Sarvajit S. Sareen and I were Dimitri’s next two PhD students. Charlie left IGT in 1968 and joined Westinghouse Electric Corporation in Pittsburgh before I earned my Doctorate in 1970. While there he developed this idea of modeling the hypothetical “Loss of Coolant Accident (LOCA)” using a new set of equations he called the interpenetrating continuum” approach. He moved to Idaho to work for Aerojet Nuclear Company (ANC) which was a part of what was then the National Reactor Testing Station (NRTS). He and his boss George Brocket sold the program to the Atomic Energy Commission in about 1971.

Lyczkowski received his BChE in from Cleveland State University, Fenn School of Engineering as well as a MS in Gas Engineering and Ph.D. in Gas Technology from Illinois Tech. He worked for Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Idaho National Engineering Laboratory, Energy Incorporated, Goodyear Atomic Corp., Hooker Chemical Corp., and as a faculty member at Illinois Tech.  He has been involved for more than forty years in chemical and nuclear engineering applications of his multiphase theory and computational fluid dynamics expertise especially in the areas of heat transfer and energy conversion to develop models that are now used by industry world-wide to design various two-phase flow equipment. He is the author of more than 150 technical publications,  50+ reports, and holds two U.S. patents. He contributed significantly to the development of the RETRAN and COMMIX computer programs. He has recently completed a book titled The History of Multiphase Science and Computational Fluid Dynamics a Personal Memoir.